For the second year, students in Keri Washburn's first grade class at Saranac Elementary School had the opportunity to participate in "pumpkin math."

According to Washburn, "pumpkin math" provides students with the opportunity to estimate the weight, height, circumference and number of seeds inside of the pumpkin, as well as whether or not it floats.

"It's a lot of fun for the students," Washburn said.

To keep the event running smoothly, five parents and five Saranac High School students were brought in as helpers. Each group of students had one teacher and one high school student assisting them in completing the project.

"We're doing this for leadership class. It's a lot of fun to be here and helping the students," said Kalli McKinch, a Saranac High School docent.

When students received their pumpkin, they had to estimate its weight, height, circumference, the number of seeds and whether or not it floated. Then, the students and volunteers would take the pumpkin apart to figure out the actual numbers.

First-graders Ruby Ehle, Marisa Klahn, Hayden Williams and Gabe Courtnay estimated that the weight of their pumpkin before carving was 60 pounds, that their pumpkin had 100 seeds, was 16 inches tall and that it would not float.

Seeds were sorted into cups based on amount: hundreds, tens and ones. According to first-grader Alyssa Possehn, her group's pumpkin contained 528 seeds.

After recording all of their measurements, members of the groups and the volunteers took turns carving the pumpkins.

Angelena Manuel, Hunter Grover, Brianna Pung, Chloe Smit and Ryan Bollone, first-graders in Washburn's class, took turns designing and carving their pumpkin. Afterward, each member of the group helped to clean their station and their tools.

Once all of the groups had finished carving and measuring their pumpkins, clean-up began. After everything had been washed and put away, the students were able to move on to their next lesson of the day.